Active Sun

Not only the number of sunspots increases during solar maximum, also the location of the sunspots changes. From the beginning of a solar cycle (at the minimum) the location of the sunspots change from higher solar latitudes to lower solar latitudes at maximum. That means that at solar maximum the sunspots tend to group around the solar equator. The new solar cycle would be signified if a sunspot would appear nearer to the north or south solar pole. From the image below one can see that we are experiencing the solar maximum currently.